Category: Crafting

crazy normal

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My immediate response when people ask lately how we are/ how I am is “Crazy, good but crazy”. However, the more I think about this the more I realize we are less and less crazy and more and more normal.  You see, before we had any kiddos we had plenty of time to do whatever we wanted whenever we wanted and honestly I am not all that sure what we did with our boat loads of free time.  After we had Jay we thought we were seriously crazy and had no free time and then we had Charlie (bringing the parent child ratio up to one-to-one) and actually had less free time.  If you would have asked me about our free time when we just had Jay I would have found it rather laughable; now I am not sure what we did with it all.  Perspective is funny that way…  All this to say that we are crazy or normal; however you want to think of it and here is a taste of our crazy brought to you by the ever present iPhone.

monkey toes

yes that is a towel and yes it is soaking wet :(

the perfect little boy entertainment

duplo towers- Jay is REALLY into building these days

squishy returns ;)

what- doesn’t everyone have a whale and a cow in their pantry?

photographer in the making

his photo

reading the Monster at the End of this Book on the ipad… he really didn’t like it at first but enjoyed it after he realized “the blue guy” (Grover) was the monster

watermelon- Jay eats EVERY last bite

I apparently haven’t dumped my phone photos in forever so instead of overloading you all in one day I will post the rest tomorrow- stay tuned for part two ;)

door hangings

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I have finally been able to complete a few of our house projects to the point of wanting to share them with you on here.  However, I need to get my act together enough to actually take photos of them so that I can share!  Until that happens I will show you these cute little name plates that I made for the boys doors.  Jay loves having his name on his door and well I love them too- they are just cute in my opinion.

I would offer up a tutorial on how to make little gems… however, step by step instructions is not really my thing and it would end up going something like this…

1. have husband make random comment about how we should put signs on the boys doors so people can tell which is the bathroom and which rooms are theirs

2. think on it- decide that embroidered name things (yes that is a technical name) would work perfectly for this

3. doodle some simple line drawings until you have a design that you like (a Jay Bird and a Charlie Tuna in our case)

4. look up how to embroider- stitches, transferring said “patterns” to fabric, etc

5. purchase the necessary fabric (this was the only thing I needed- yes, I had embroidery floss and a hoop and I haven’t ever done any stitching until now…)

6. do all of the pattern transferring

7. stitch it all up

8. iron out the creases in the fabric that were made from the hoop

9. spray paint some simple wooden frames to match the rooms/ embroidery

10. rig up the frame so it would hold the embroidery

And, since I am pretty sure those kind of instructions won’t be helpful… I won’t give you any more than that ;)  Just know that I enjoyed making them and that if you give it a whirl you might too.

Also, just so you don’t think that I have the luxury of time here’s a photo to keep it real for you…

Yes, that is me ironing on a towel in the kitchen while a sweet kiddo (if you look closely you can see his sweet little red head over the top of the couch in the first picture) plays with duplo and very large trucks!

our chalkboard wall

Published on by kristenperreault2 Comments

In a moment of insanity I decided that it would be a good idea to redecorate our home… this moment came sometime after Jamie went back to work after Charlie was born and probably after days of not getting out much.  I told Jamie that it had never really felt like ‘our’ home (we were younger when we moved in and painted every wall in the house and I most certainly would not pick the stuff that I picked out then again) and that I really wanted a change. Surprisingly, he agreed to let me change things up and I haven’t looked back since.

If I had my way we would be able to do it all in one fell swoop (I hate the in-between stages of projects); however, our budget says otherwise and we are doing it little bit by little bit after saving and budgeting for the changes… it’s what we can do right now so it works ;)

I am nowhere near being ready to share any before and after photos with you all (like I said it’s been a process); however, I do want to show off one of my favorite changes so far- our kitchen chalkboard wall!  We took the simple green wall in the kitchen and turned a 4×8 section of it into a massive chalkboard!  I was desperate to find something to entertain my super busy toddler during the last hour before Daddy gets home- you know the hour when he is tired, hungry and cranky AND I am trying to make dinner and entertain my littlest chunk of love.  We needed something that would allow for both of us to be alive and in one piece when Jamie walks through the door and we hit the jackpot with this addition.  Our little bird loves it and it proves to be a great conversation piece after Daddy gets home and we sit down for supper.  I am sorry but I really don’t have any great tutorials on how to make one of these for yourself and I certainly didn’t take any photos of the during process; however, if you really would like more info feel free to leave a comment and I will try to answer as best I can.

couldn't resist

Jay is on a dinosaur kick right now so this is commissioned work... (don't judge the artist too much!)

finger lickin’ good

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Yesterday afternoon, Jay took this (vanilla pudding finger paint)

and made these masterpieces!!

He was one heck of a mess by the end of it but a good time was had by all!

slowly getting into his groove
realizing that it was edible AND tasted good!
asking for more
his concentration face (his Daddy has one too)
love his face in this one
a fun mess
"show me your hands"

a little sentimental

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I feel like Jay is growing up so fast these days- walking, “talking” and acting like such a big boy.  So this AM while I was feeling particularly sentimental I decided to freeze time and capture just how tiny my little guy still is.  He laughed and giggled the whole time we were doing our project- so, so sweet!  Thank goodness for sweet spring weather, porches to paint on, adorable little boy giggles and those tiny hands that constantly pull at my heart strings…

christmas craftiness

Published on by kristenperreault3 Comments

I love crafting; however, I don’t get a whole bunch of time to do it anymore.  So this year, as an excuse (kind of) to be able to, I decided to make a good majority of our Christmas presents.  I love getting things that are homemade from people; I love the thought and time that is put into those gifts.  I hope that people we know do to, since I am probably going to try and do the same next year too! Although, in a perfect world I would start a little sooner in the year than I did this year.  Check out some of the projects we gave…

a necklace that I made for Holly with interchangeable flower pins
cookies that I used for my Mom and Frannie's place card at Christmas dinner
more gingerbread cookies
an elephant pupet that I made for Jay
a camera case that I made for Holly- by far my favorite gift to give, I love how it turned out!
shirts made for Jay using freezer paper stencils- a snowflake initial and a "jay bird" shirt
hooper crossing shirts for Aunt Nicole
2010 ornament, Jay's- a Jay Bird and Jamie's- a carrot because we put in the garden this year
bows, bows and more bows that I used for gift wrapping (can be worn later in hair on shirts, purses etc)
a wrapped present with bow
our table set for Christmas dinner
Jamie's place setting
Jamie making pickles
lots and lots of pickles!!

Some of the things that I made but forgot to take pictures of included a “Grandma and Me” book for my Mom, a Perreault Memory Game for my three year old cousin (this was adorable and I regret not getting a picture of it… I’ll have to make one for Jay and take pictures), a frame with family pictures for Mimi (we didn’t make the frame but the pictures are all ours), dog rope toys, pickles- which Jamie and I made together (I actually did take pictures while we were making them just none of them packaged nicely and ready to be given), a delicious honey- cinnamon butter, homemade Almond Joys (that I may or may not have “tasted” while making)cookies, cookies and more cookies!  I think when I added up my cookie total I was up to somewhere around 375 and that didn’t count the candy and other baking!

projects…

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With the holidays right around the corner I have a ton of projects going on throughout the house- really it’s a wonder I find anything I need on my dining room table these days.  I love, love, love making (and getting) homemade gifts; they are so much fun, in my opinion!  I can’t wait until after Christmas so I can show off a few of them to you all.  But until then, check out the what we brought to the party for Leyton yesterday…

I wanted to make Leyton an Airplane coloring book since he loved to color so much the last time I was there and he can't seem to get enough of airplanes- I'd show the front but it wasn't super exciting
pages for the airplane coloring book- aren't they cute planes?! I thought they were adorable; Wally's my favorite :-)

An airplane t-shirt to match the incredibly cute and creative party invitations. The party was an airplane theme party and Nan made the invites look like boarding passes. She's good isn't she?

a bow tie!!

Published on by kristenperreault2 Comments

I am in love, seriously in love with Jays bow tie!

I saw a pattern to make a bow tie online a few months back and decided that aside from my lack of sewing skills (I am not an exact or calculated person- ask my husband) nothing was stopping me from making one!  So I decided to ask my Mom to borrow her sewing machine, purchased a bit of adorable fabric and gosh darn it if I didn’t make a bow tie!  Please don’t let this give you the false impression that I can really sew, the lines aren’t quite straight and I really, really need to invest in a seam ripper, I just can simply get by in the sewing department… either way I love the end result and you can bet that there will be more!

turkey thursday

Published on by kristenperreault2 Comments

Well, not quite but almost… which in itself freaks me out!  How can Thanksgiving only be 2 weeks away!?!  But I digress…

Check out these adorable (if I do say so myself) bows that I made for Jamie’s cousins in Charleston.  I fell in love with the idea when I came across it online a few weeks ago and just had, had, had to make them!  They were super easy and didn’t take long at all- if you have a little girl they are, in my opinion, a must for Thanksgiving day apparel :-)  I will be shipping the package out in the mail today for them (I addressed it to the girls)- I remember how I loved to get mail when I was little, heck I still love getting packages in the mail!

Oh yeah, I can’t remember where I saw the original idea or I would give that person the credit but I figured out how to make the bows here.